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Summary

Explore legal issues that often hinder the work of child welfare practitioners!

Child Welfare in the Legal Setting: A Critical and Interpretive Perspective is a revolutionary study of the child welfare system that is essential for practitioners, educators, and students interested in public child welfare work. It examines the legal system surrounding child welfare workers and highlights their need for agency-specific training. This insightful book challenges the traditional rules of child welfare and paves the way for alternate methods of conceptualizing and organizing child protection. It explores why many family interventions fail and others never even occur. By identifying incongruities between the philosophy of child welfare and its function, this book advocates a more individualistic and efficient technique for assisting clients. Addressing issues and challenges from the initial identification of problems to navigating the legal system, this book is also thorough enough for public child welfare workers who want to take their skills to the next level.

The large-system perspective in this book uses the concentric circle model, the rational legal model of legal and court action, and the ritualized process model to examine child welfare practice. Learn why terms such as child abuse and neglect have become social constructions that vary depending on the values of social workers, judges, attorneys, agencies, and communities. Child Welfare in the Legal Setting: A Critical and Interpretive Perspective examines the standardization of the organizational activities of child welfare systems and how this limits professionals’ ability to accurately recognize unique problems and intervene in the most beneficial manner.

Child Welfare in the Legal Setting: A Critical and Interpretive Perspective identifies vital issues by analyzing the ethical and moral foundations of the child welfare system. This insightful book also takes a close look at how practitioners inadvertently devalue their clients by using language that creates stigmatized social categories such as victim and convicted felon. Supervisors, managers, social workers and child welfare practitioners will benefit from this information. The vignettes that supplement the narrative also make the book an important resource in any child welfare course.

Table of Contents

Preface and Acknowledgments

Chapter 1. Beginnings

Introduction

The Book: An Overview

Some Important Concepts or Assumptions

The Individual As Constructing Meaning

Abstract Systems

Social Institutions As Abstract Systems

The Social and Cultural World

Conclusion

SECTION I: SANCTION, AUTHORITY, AND THE LEGAL SYSTEM

Chapter 2. The Institutional Context of Child Welfare

Global Perspectives

Child Well-Being at Societal, Institutional, and Family Levels

International Perspectives on Protecting Children from Parents/Caretakers

Child Abuse and Neglect As Social Categories

The American Child Welfare System

The Organization of Child Welfare Programs

Conclusion

Chapter 3. Governance, Legitimacy, and Trust

Introduction

The American System: A Focus on Parental or Caretaker Behavior

Child Protective Services As Child Welfare

Child Welfare As an Industry

Prevention

American Child Welfare As Intervention into Family Life

Constitutional Rights

Conclusion

Chapter 4. Multiple Dimensions of Child Welfare Governance

Introduction

The Constitution and Fragmented Authority

The Federalist Structure

The Administrative Structure

Law and Policy by Appellate Decisions

Legislation by Oversight

Conclusion

Chapter 5. The Organizational Context of Practice

Introduction

The Community As a Context for Child Welfare

The Industrialization of Child Welfare

The Effects of Industrialization: Alienation, Trained Incapacity, and Case Production

The Social Worker’s Role As Mediating Levels of Organization

Conclusion

Chapter 6. The Legal System As Host Setting: Context and History

Introduction

Practice in a Host Setting

Tensions: Social Workers in Court Settings

History of the Social Work Profession

Conclusion

Chapter 7. Images and Realities of the Legal System: Metaphor, Myths, and Stereotypes

Introduction

Stereotypes: Their Nature and Action

Understanding Conflict Between Social Workers and Attorneys

Social Work in Public Child Welfare

Conclusion

SECTION II: COURTS, MODELS, AND RITUALS

Chapter 8. The Courts

Introduction

The Varieties of Courts

Child Welfare Courts: Nonvoluntary Interventions

Voluntary Child and Family Courts

Ancillary Courts and Legal Issues

Litigation: Social Work Liability, Forensic Responsibility, and Agency Action

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